fandomhigh | Practical Philosophy, Friday

Entry tags:

practical philosophy

Practical Philosophy, Friday

Students arriving at the designated classroom would find a note resting on the door to come find Ender outside; the weather was good, and in a place like Fandom, Ender felt, whimsy played a big part of life. Why not teach class outside?

He was sitting outside by the treeline, a plastic bag full of sandwiches at his side.

He didn't begin to speak until everyone was there, though he'd waved one hand at the sandwiches to make it clear they were up for grabs.

"If you've come here for a lightning lecture on the dialogues of Plato or the nihilism of Nietzsche, or any other firm, philosophical field that gives some manner of answers," he started, "You're in the wrong place."

He shot the class a wry look. "I don't have any," he said. "I've got a great deal of data in my head, but no answers. And while the philosophers of yore might make for a good touchstone for our existence, I believe most things are too complicated to rely exclusively on the wisdom of our elders. Of course," he added, "I'm not an elder, so it's possible I might have something to gain from saying something like that."

"My name is Andrew Wiggin," Ender continued. "Some people call me Ender. I'm a graduating student; some of you have met me before, some of you I've passed in the halls, and some of you are new entirely."

He nodded towards his TA. "This is my teaching assistant, the lovely Tara Maclay," he said. "And I might have been lying earlier - we do have some answers and wisdom to offer in this class, but those are almost exclusively her domain." He flashed Tara a smile.

Then he turned back towards the class. "This class is about opening a dialogue," he said. "Partly because the island has a habit of pulling in people with interesting problems, problems worth talking about. And partly because I'm an inquisitive fool who likes to learn about human beings, and stupidly assumes other people do, too."

"Don't get me wrong, though. If you don't want to talk about yourself, don't. I'm perfectly happy to spend a class debating Hegel with you instead - though I do expect everyone to participate, no matter what the topic. If you have something to say, say it, and we'll judge between the lot of us whether it merits the conversation."

He stretched out, planting his hands behind him in the grass. "We won't be doing introductions today," he added. "I know it's the season for it, and I know there are good reasons to do it. To foster a sense of who everyone is, to start grafting the roles we're to take opposite one another, teacher to student and student to student, student to teacher. This might be a stupid call on my part; after all, I know some of your names only off the roll given to me."

"But I'd rather get to know you by what you find worth talking about," he continued, "than your name and a few stock answers. So we're just going to do as I intend to for the rest of this course: we're going to have a dialogue. We're going to talk. And we'll see where we wind up." He paused. "Though please remember this is a safe space, of a sort, and I won't hesitate to deal with anyone who decides to behave like a jackass."

He smiled again, mostly for the class's sake. "For some of you, this is all new. How is it working for you? Are you elated? Annoyed? Don't want to be here? Achingly happy to be here? And for those of you who aren't - how has the past year treated you? Has there been anything that made you cry or made you think or made you wonder?"

"We can talk about that. Or we can talk about something else. I'm open to talking about anything, as long as you think it's worth questioning. Because you can assume from here on in that I really don't know a thing; but maybe by educating me, you can find something worth educating yourself about."

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

No introductions. Just talking. Answer any of Ender's questions, if you want, or bring up something you feel is relevant. Or not.

[[ messy is the rule around here! ping off each other, ping off each other's threads, get a major discussion started, it's all open. ]]

Edited 2012-05-11 08:34 (UTC)

Britta did come back around after a moment, though, toward the end of the rambling lecture to catch the gist of what the conversation was supposed to be. She thought about it for a moment, listening to what the others had to say, thinking about what she had to say. She always had a lot to say, it was true, but she decided this was a time to choose her words wisely.

Besides, it was hard to pick just one rant out of the fifty million that were buzzing through her head at all times. For today, she decided to keep it simple in response to the whole being here aspect of it.

"School is bullshit," she said. "The things you learn in a classroom are only useful if you wind up either going to more classrooms or joining the mindless masses in the corporate rat race they've invented. It's all brainwashing. Even this. If I wanted to sit outside and talk about things, I'd go to southern California and do it. At least then there'd be weed."

And bangable smelly hippies.

"So you'd say there was absolutely nothing you've ever been taught in a classroom that had any merit whatsoever?" Ender asked.

His non-judgmental face was epic. It needed to be; he already thought she was very, very foolish.

"It's all indoctrination," he said, "Meant to pry you away from a state of-- what, exactly?"

"Freedom," Britta said. "Obviously. And I didn't say that nothing useful's ever been taught in a classroom, I just think that everything you learn outside of a classroom is a whole lot more useful. And, no, taking a class outside doesn't mean going outside the classroom, either. Curriculum in public schools have been used to churn out the same old bullshit year after year, establishing an outdated status quo in desperate need of a new world order."

"You think the curriculum in this school is the same old bullshit year after year?"

A tiny bit of amusement now, if you knew where to look.

"What if the thing that made you think the most was also the one that promoted the most fear and is still something you worry about happening again?"

"That depends," Ender said. "Did thinking about it bring you to something constructive? Did you learn from it? Did you figure out a way to prevent it?"

She was quiet for a long moment.

"No, I haven't been able to come up with a way to prevent it ever happening again." Then she smiled at him. "But, I did learn that sometimes tactics are better in a fight than a flat out emotion-based attack. And, I did realize that whether I want them to or not, I have people around me that will do things I don't like in order to protect me."

Clayton.

"So you'll be able to plan ahead," Ender replied. "How would you use that information next time?"

"I've been here almost two years now," William shared. "I came because, well. Those who were in charge of such things as educating and disciplining me were running out of patience," which might seem strange to anyone who knew him as soft-spoken (though easily excitable when it came to science) and polite. "In any case, I'm glad I did come. I've learned more in those two years than I ever could've hoped to, back home, and discovered a few things about myself in the process."

"What was it you were looking for, that you were such a frustrating student?" Ender wondered. "Was it that the teachers couldn't provide, or you were asking for the wrong things, or both?"

"I think it was mostly the first thing," William admitted. "I was raised by Jesuits, and they place a great deal of importance on education, but it was by necessity a very broad sort of education. I had questions, and no one seemed to have the time to answer them. So I sought my own answers, and more often than not ended up in trouble for it."

"In that regard, modern times are rather more facilitating when it comes to the pursuit of knowledge," Ender said. "Well, on some patches of the Earth, at least. I suspect in your time it would've been more limited in general."

Re: Talk.

faithandscience.livejournal.com - 2012-05-11 19:32 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Talk.

endsthegame - 2012-05-11 19:33 (UTC) - Expand

Tara had been picking at an egg salad sandwich while Ender spoke, and when he introduced her she swallowed fast and brought her fingers up to get any mayonnaise off her mouth. She managed the timing so it was only moderately embarrassing.

When the discussion period started: "I don't know if I have, um, wisdom or answers or ... any of the really nice stuff Ender said," she offered. "I'm mostly here to think about stuff, like anybody. If you want a topic, lately I've been thinking a lot about ... closure, I guess. Moving on."

"Because of graduation, I take it," Ender said, with a little smile. "Well, the rest of them still have at least another year to go. If you've got any tips or thoughts, now's the time."

"Graduation is a huge part of it," Tara had to agree. The other part was Kennedy, and that was a bit personal for the first day of class. "I guess my one tip is ... I don't want to cling, you know? I want to be here for the summer, but life is too huge to keep living in something that's already happened."

"I know what you mean," said Ender, who had been rearing to leave since about his freshman year. Because that was healthy. "We've had some formative experiences here, no doubt about it. But this island isn't where either of our futures lay. It'd be foolish to deny yourself new experiences by clinging to the old."

Peeta could start a conversation on just about anything, but he was glad that Ender had at least provided a jumping off point. "I know I've been here less than a week, but I think this place is gonna be good for me. I like how open everyone is and how it's less restrictive than where I came from. People keep telling me about all the weird stuff that goes on, but it doesn't scare me any. It's kind of exciting."

"Why is your home so restrictive?" Ender wondered. "Do you think there's a good reason for it, but not a fit for you - or do you think it doesn't work for anyone?"

"There is no good reason for what they do. My government just wants to keep their people completely at their mercy," Peeta said, feeling a bit strange about being allowed to talk about this. "There was a rebellion against them almost a hundred years ago that was put down. To keep it from happening again they force us to play their games."

Ender refrained from noting he had a little experience with some variant of that strategy, though he did think briefly of the one conversation he had had with Katniss, who had spoken of something similar in her world.

"And it's effective," Ender surmised. "Do these games offer fear or distraction, or both? They've got to be doing something right."

Re: Talk.

district12baker.livejournal.com - 2012-05-11 19:24 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Talk.

endsthegame - 2012-05-11 19:29 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Talk.

district12baker.livejournal.com - 2012-05-11 19:34 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Talk.

endsthegame - 2012-05-11 19:43 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Talk.

district12baker.livejournal.com - 2012-05-11 19:46 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Talk.

endsthegame - 2012-05-11 19:53 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Talk.

district12baker.livejournal.com - 2012-05-11 19:57 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Talk.

endsthegame - 2012-05-11 20:00 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Talk.

district12baker.livejournal.com - 2012-05-11 20:06 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Talk.

endsthegame - 2012-05-11 20:13 (UTC) - Expand

"I'm excited to be here," Sholeh said with a small smile. "I volunteered to come after we heard about this place. I'm scared, but it's a good scared sometimes, too. I'm learning things that no one in my home village would ever have thought to teach. I'm far from home and some days I can feel every mile, but it's an adventure I never would have expected."

"People from your home village don't travel much?" Ender asked.

"Uhh, some do?" Sholeh said carefully. "But for necessity. And they don't really talk about where they went when they come back."

If they came back.

"People don't really like outsiders, much, I guess. So my people have a hard time when they travel elsewhere."

"Is that why your travellers don't talk about it, either?" Ender asked. "The outside being alien, even at home?"

Re: Talk.

3girls-1core.livejournal.com - 2012-05-12 20:41 (UTC) - Expand

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only